And yet it would be wrong to suppose their path to have been altogether sad. It was illumined by love, the heavy load was lightened by mutual help. Their devotion to each other, and joint pursuit of literature, was an immense compensation in their hard fate, bringing, as it ever does, the ideal into the actual, and casting a glamour of romance over the most heart-breaking realities of existence. They had also many friends--friends after their own heart--who loved the intellectual converse of their humble home, and who knew well the circumstances of their saddened lives. These would include from time to time many of the choicest spirits of the age, whom the genius and gentleness of Lamb brought to his side. Barry Cornwall, in his memoir, says:-- "Lamb and his sister had an open party once a week, every Wednesday evening, where his friends generally went to visit him, without any special invitation. He invited you suddenly, not pressingly; but with such heartiness that you at once agreed to come. There was usually a game at whist on these evenings, in which the stakes were very moderate, indeed, almost nominal. When my thoughts turn backward, as they sometimes do, to those past days, I see my dear old friend again--'in my mind's eye, Horatio'--with his outstretched hand, and his grave, sweet smile of welcome. It was always in a room of moderate size, comfortably, but plainly furnished, that he lived. An old mahogany table was opened out in the middle of the room, round which, and near the walls, were old high-backed chairs (such as our grandfathers used), and a long plain bookcase completely filled with old books. These were his 'ragged veterans.' Here Charles Lamb sat, when at home, always near the table. At the opposite side was his sister, engaged in some domestic work, knitting or sewing, or poring over a modern novel. 'Bridget in some things is behind her years.' In fact, although she was ten years older than her brother, she had more sympathy with modern books and with youthful fancies than he had. She wore a neat cap of the fashion of her youth, and an old-fashioned dress. Her face was pale and somewhat square, but very placid, with grey, intelligent eyes. She was very mild in her manner to strangers, and to her brother gentle and tender always. She had often an upward look of peculiar meaning when directed towards him, as though to give him assurance that all was then well with her. His affection for her was somewhat less on the surface, but always present. There was great gratitude intermingled with it. 'In the days of weakling infancy,' he writes, 'I was her tender charge, as I have been her care in foolish manhood since.' Then he adds pathetically, 'I wish I could throw into a heap the remainder of our joint existences, that we might share them in equal division.'"